Faculty Hiring Questions

Information for potential applicants for faculty searches in PBS

 

On this page:

Search Advocates

Societal Benefit, Access, Fairness, and Empowerment

Bloomington

Connections with Campus Centers + Programs

Tenure-Track Faculty

Lecturers, Senior Lecturers, + Teaching Professors

Visiting Assistant Professors (VAPs)

 

Search Advocates

Sometimes, job applicants and candidates have questions about a department’s culture and what it’s like to live and work at a particular institution/town given its demographic composition and other socio-cultural characteristics. People may want to ask questions like these in confidence, outside the context of the formal search committee. Below is a list of PBS faculty who are happy to serve as such contacts (i.e., be search advocates). We encourage potential applicants and candidates to reach out to these faculty if they have such questions.

The list below is everyone who was identified and who agreed to the role of search advocate, despite that they may also be serving on one of our current search committees. We acknowledge that this could reflect a conflict of interest for that search advocate and applicants to the search to which they have been appointed.

Contact information for search advocates to ask questions about the hiring process, department, campus, and Bloomington:

 

Societal Benefit, Access, Fairness, and Empowerment

  • As with the campus, the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences (PBS) is committed to fostering a community of faculty, staff, graduate students, and fellows who have a wide range of backgrounds, experiences, and other forms of difference. PBS considers as core strengths of our mission that we value differences in perspectives, create a culture of fairness, and that we empower all department members. 
  • However, looking at the faculty bios page, you notice that the faculty demographics are skewed relative to the demographics of both the country and the state, particularly for the tenure-track faculty. Graduate students demographics are also skewed, although not as badly as the faculty. 
  • Incorporating a broad range of ideas, perspectives, and approaches to research, teaching, and governance is critical to the success of our department and to the service we provide to the university, the state, and the world. 
  • Results from our annual departmental climate survey and a recent self-study of hiring outcomes have convinced the faculty that our search practices must include more evidence-based principles to broaden the applicant pool and limit discrimination in the selection process.

 

Bloomington

  • Close to three metropolitan centers: one hour to Indianapolis (55 minutes to IND international airport); 1.75 hours to Louisville, KY; and 2.5 hours to Cincinnati, OH
  • High salary relative to cost of living
  • High quality of life
  • IU has a flexible remote work policy
  • Family friendly
  • Bloomington Public Transit is free for faculty
  • IU is the home to a world-renowned school of music and theatre departments, hosting over a thousand performances each year. In addition, you'll find some of the best shows from Broadway each year at the IU Auditorium.
  • IU is part of Big Ten athletics. Our swimming and diving squads are perennially among the nation’s best. The Women's basketball team advanced to their first Elite Eight showing during the 2021 NCAA tournament, and currently ranked 4th in the nation this year. In 2022, for the 16th time in program history the Men's soccer team made it to NCAA championship game. The men’s baseball team won the Big Ten Championship in 2019. The Spirit of Indiana: 24 Sports, One Team.

 

Connections with campus centers + programs

Cognitive Science

Program in Neuroscience

Indiana Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute (ICTSI)

Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning (CITL)

Faculty Academy on Excellence in Teaching (FACET)

 

Tenure-Track Faculty

Research
  • The startup package for new assistant professors includes research funds that are highly competitive with our peer institutions.
  • The startup package includes costs of renovating laboratory space as necessary.
  • Time for research is prioritized for early-level faculty by limiting committee and other service work in their pre-tenure years.
  • The department is very supportive of early-level faculty and is very collaborative overall.
  • IU provides considerable funding to the department for graduate students (i.e., only about half of our students are funded through awards, grants, etc.). These institutional funds are given through student academic appointments (SAA; almost all are teaching assistantships). Our practice is to share these appointments equitably, which means that new assistant professors can recruit graduate students to their labs with relatively attractive stipends before acquiring funding sources of their own to provide stipends for students.
  • In addition to the NIMH-funded T32 clinical translational science research training grant, clinical students can also be supported by NIDA T32 and NICHD T32 training grants if their research is of sufficient match.
  • IU has two “core” campuses, IU Bloomington (IUB), which is the oldest and largest, and IU Indianapolis (IUI), which is in Indianapolis next to the IU School of Medicine (IUSoM). Collaborations between IUB, IUI, and IUSoM are encouraged and our department actively engages in these collaborations.
Teaching
  • For tenure-track faculty, teaching load is no more than three (3 credit) courses per year – 2 courses one semester and 1 course the other semester.
  • Pre-tenure faculty are typically encouraged to teach one large undergraduate “service” course (80+ students), one small undergraduate course in your area of research expertise (<30 students), and a graduate course. Options are available to take over an existing course and/or develop a new course completely. Semester-long practicum supervision (e.g., in clinical science) to 5 or more students is credited as a graduate course.
  • Teaching the same course multiple semesters and multiple years is encouraged to minimize time spent on preparation and to measure a trajectory of improved teaching.
  • The startup package for new assistant professors typically includes 3 pre-tenure course releases in line with aims to protect research time during this early stage.
Tenure + Promotion
  • Tenure criteria are relatively transparent and we are currently updating them to be even more transparent.
  • Every assistant and associate professor is assigned a three-person “advancement and promotion” (A&P) committee that mentors them from hiring to tenure and promotion to associate professor and subsequent promotion to full professor.
  • The A&P committee meets at least once per year to provide feedback about the faculty’s progress and trajectory toward tenure/promotion.
  • For the “third-year review”, the A&P committee provides even more thorough feedback.
  • The goal of the department is to hire faculty who will be successful in their scholarly responsibilities, enjoy their work, remain on our faculty, and become productive full professors.

 

Lecturers, Senior Lecturers, + Teaching Professors

Teaching
  • Teaching load is no more than five (3 credit) courses per academic year – 3 courses one semester and 2 courses the other semester. Summer teaching options are typically available with supplemental pay.
  • Teaching assignments consider faculty expertise and are distributed across larger introductory courses and smaller advanced courses according to curricular needs.
  • We encourage faculty to teach the same courses regularly to minimize time spent on new course preparation, optimally develop given courses, and be able to measure a trajectory of improved teaching.
  • Funds are provided to support instruction and advance faculty development (conferences, workshops, society memberships, etc.).
Service
  • Lecturer-stream faculty serve on departmental, college- and university-level committees, which provide important networking opportunities and wider perspectives on the workings of the university
  • Lecturer-stream faculty attend faculty meetings and participate in departmental governance.
Promotion
  • Promotion criteria are relatively transparent and we are currently updating them to be even more transparent.
  • Every lecturer-stream faculty member is assigned a three-person “advancement and promotion” (A&P) committee that mentors them from hiring to through subsequent promotions to Senior Lecturer and Teaching Professor.
  • The A&P committee meets at least once per year to provide feedback about the faculty’s progress and trajectory toward promotion and reappointment.
  • The goal of the department is to hire faculty who will excel in the classroom, enjoy their work, be successful in their scholarly responsibilities, and become productive teaching faculty.
Research
  • While lecturer-stream faculty members’ promotions are based strictly on teaching and service, pedagogy-related research is encouraged and supported through department and university resources (e.g., direct faculty allocations and grants).

 

Visiting Assistant Professors (VAPs)

Teaching
  • Teaching load is no more than five (3 credit) courses per academic year – 3 courses one semester and 2 courses the other semester. Summer teaching options are typically available with supplemental pay.
  • Teaching assignments consider faculty expertise and are distributed across larger introductory courses and smaller advanced courses according to curricular needs.
  • We encourage faculty to teach the same courses regularly to minimize time spent on new course preparation, optimally develop given courses, and be able to measure a trajectory of improved teaching.
  • Funds are provided to support instruction and advance faculty development (conferences, workshops, society memberships, etc.).
Research
  • VAP faculty are encouraged to integrate with research faculty and their labs in order to promote professional development and continue their research interests as their schedules allow.
Contract
  • VAPs are appointed to an initial 1-year contract that is renewable for one additional year, based on satisfactory teaching performance.